The Fiery Arrow

by Bo Burnette

  Brallaghan’s voice came again. “Arliss, I have a plan! The dam—we can break the dam!”

  Her heart jumped at Brallaghan’s idea—the same she had stumbled upon earlier. Perhaps so…

  “I’m going to help the king. He’s right, though—breaking the dam could bring down the fortress.” Philip’s eyes were grim. “In case I don’t get through this, know that I do think of myself as your brother. And I think you’re just about the bloody best sister a fellow could ask for.”

  A strong impulse to kiss him rose in her chest. She didn’t. Instead, she responded, “Thank you. Now go—go to my father.”

  He turned on the heel of his boots and left, dashing towards where the king was also running to Thane’s mountainous throne.

  “Arliss, we need you, now!” Brallaghan’s voice was insistent. “I care about you, and I care about winning this fight. Come quickly!”

  Still facing the dais, she shook her head. Brallaghan had always been her friend, but now she knew that was all he could ever be. She didn’t want to break his heart. But he could never give her what Philip had already given her.

  She faced him. “I’m sorry, Brallaghan. Do what you can about breaking the dam. I have to help Philip.”

  She strode away from the wall and towards the embellished room. Thane’s army had aligned together. The snakes moved like a second unit of troops.

  And facing them—only she, Philip, Kenton, and Nathanael.

  Wood splintered behind her. Swords chopped through the doors on either side of the waterway entrance. Erik and his troops burst through the doors as they whooped and called out “For Reinhold!”

  Arliss’s attempt at a last stand became an exultant charge of the army.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE: SORCERY AND MAGIC

  The left wing of the fortress lay emptied of guards, so Arliss entered the opulent room and its exotic furnishings. A flash of white light met her eyes. Her hand dropped from the door handle.

  An enormous plant, its vines and streamers spreading out across the floor in every direction, stood in the place of the tiny sprout which Arliss had planted only a few days before. White flowers clustered upon the chest, crept up the bedpost, and blanketed the floor with a gleaming white as of snow. Lasairbláth had to be a magical plant, in one way or another. Never before in her life had she seen something grow this quickly and this beautifully.

  Ivory petals so filled the slender vines that some flower clusters had already fallen off, drying upon the hard dirt floor. She stuffed as many as would fit into the pockets of her dress.

  With the lamps unlit, the room was dark, but one thing was strangely missing: the violin she had played just a few days ago. Thane said it had belonged to one of his men. Why had he removed it?

  It didn’t matter. There was a battle to fight. She exited the room and flew back into the bailey of the fortress.

  She had an arrow nocked and ready.

  Ilayda glanced back and forth between the snakes and the troops that rushed to meet Erik’s company. Cupping her hands around her mouth, she shouted, “Erik! Over here!”

  He turned about, his long legs pumping as he dashed over to her and Brallaghan. Lord Adam took his place at the head of the Reinholdian soldiers even as they joined the fray with Thane’s warriors.

  Ilayda gave him no time to recover his breath. “You have to help us.”

  “Help you in what way?”

  Brallaghan stood from his crouch by the wall. “We’re going to break down the wall. Arliss ordered it.”

  “Well, she approved of it,” Ilayda said. “Which isn’t exactly the same thing.”

  Erik gripped his longbow. “How on earth do you expect to bring down this wall? It’s massive, and it’s thick.”

  “We don’t have to bring down the wall,” Brallaghan said. “We can let the river do it. Release enough of the river, and it’ll crumble the wall bit by bit.”

  “Are you sure?”

  “Yes. We just need to dig ditches where the two doors are on either side of the river entrance. If we can get water flooding in through that way, it’ll undermine the foundation.”

  “That won’t do anything fast. You do realize that, I hope?” Erik fisted around the grip of his longbow, obviously anxious to return to battle.

  “We know,” Ilayda said. “But there is still a chance. A hope.” As she finished speaking, a drop of water splashed onto her eyelashes. She blinked upwards. The clouds had started to release their contents directly over Thane’s stronghold. She murmured again, “A hope.”

  “Of course there is a hope.” Arliss strode toward them holding her bow and arrow in one hand, and a fistful of Lasairbláth in the other.

  Arliss handed out the shining petals as quickly as she could, emptying her pockets.

  “There are many more flowers—more than you could possibly need—in the left gallery, first room on the right. Get all you need from there, but be careful. I will cover for you when I can, but I may be busy. You have to pile as much Lasairbláth as you can against the walls.” She gave a worried glance at the sky. “And pray it doesn’t rain too much.”

  Across the fortress, the torches flamed halfway up the stony mound at the back of the clearing. They sat in iron sconces lodged into the sides of the platform at points well higher than a man’s head. She snatched up a fistful of Lasairbláth for use against the snakes and turned.

  Philip was fighting Cahal, not far from the right-hand staircase up the dais. Snakes surrounded the clash of swords which had spread throughout the bailey. The devilishly cunning creatures darted in and out, hissing and biting at the Reinholdians wherever they could.

  It was clear: Thane commanded these creatures through some form of sorcery, training them and bending them to his will. She shuddered to think of a mind that was that powerful—and that corrupted.

  “Very well,” she whispered to herself. “You have sorcery. I will fight you with magic.”

  She pierced a cluster of petals with an arrowhead and killed a serpent which was gliding towards Lord Adam. She poisoned three more snakes in the same way, but at least eight or so still crawled in and out of the frenzy. She had just two arrows left. She couldn’t risk to use them both on snakes.

  An arrow whizzed past her head, sending her adrenaline spiking as she glanced about to see who shot at her.

  Erik had crowned his arrow with white petals. The snakes gave up on attacking the main fray of arms and came slithering, hissing towards Arliss and Erik.

  She dashed towards the left colonnade, jumped and rebounded off of the wall—both for momentum and to avoid the serpents. One turned about, coiled, and sprang at her, but she stuck it with an arrow before it could reach her. Behind her, Erik shot snake after snake. She didn’t turn around again, but kept running, darting around the fighting in an effort to reach Philip—and her uncle—and her father.

  She arrived just in time to see Philip ending his fight, not by killing Cahal as he could have, but by slamming his head into the side of the stony platform. Cahal crumpled to the ground, unconscious. Philip’s eyes met hers and she nodded, silently applauding his chivalry in ending the fight so.

  Her father’s burning yell drew her attention to the top of the dais.

  Thane and her father had been fighting relentlessly atop the immense heap of rock. Kenton held his own, but Thane was in his home, and far too clever at his own tricks. He played the offensive and forced Kenton to take step after step backwards.

  Kenton swung wide.

  Thane ducked. Then he sliced his sword up into Kenton’s, forcing his arm backwards and throwing off his balance.

  Arliss watched in horror as her father fell from the dais—grappling with the air—and slammed into the ground below.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR: PROMISE

  Nathanael, his sword bared and ready, dashed away from the main fight and leapt up the left stone staircase to challenge Thane.

  Arliss hurried to her father and knelt beside him. “Are you all right?”
/>
  Kenton gasped for the air which had been blasted out of his lungs. “Does it look…like it?”

  “I have to go. Thane must be stopped.” Arliss licked her dry lips.

  “No!” He gripped her hand. “No, do not go up those stairs!”

  “I must.”

  “I know you are willing to die—even for me. I see that now. And I am sorry for whatever I did to cause you to leave and produce all this mess in the first place. But his fight is not with you.”

  “It’s not with you, either. At least, not you alone. Thane has enemies everywhere he turns. Still, it is my duty to protect my people.”

  “But you are a young woman.”

  “I know—it is not within any man’s honor to kill a woman. Father, it will not come to that. I will try to reason with him. You must trust me.”

  Kenton grimaced as he gasped for air. Perhaps he had broken a rib or more, but he still managed to utter a few more words. “I trust you now, Arliss. It is Thane I do not trust.”

  She nodded, then shouted towards the ongoing clash of swordsmen, many in utter deadlocks. “Lord Adam!”

  Ilayda’s father turned his head.

  “Get someone to help my father—now! Make sure he gets out of here alive!”

  She gave one last, wistful look at her father. Then she turned and leapt across the river which bisected the entire fortress, heading for where Philip stood by the right side of the mound.

  Philip ached. His wrists ached from hanging in those rope bonds, from struggling against them, and from tearing free. His shoulders ached from slamming against the wooden door of his cell to bash it open. His arms ached from wielding the long sword. His eyes ached and wanted to shut from sheer lack of sleep.

  It was time to end this. Arliss wouldn’t have the stomach to kill Thane. But if it came to it, he would.

  Arliss strode towards him and gripped his left shoulder. He grimaced, but apparently she didn’t notice. “I have to get to the torches.”

  She pointed upwards at the stone mound. A blazing torch perched in an iron rack embedded in the stone. An identical one stuck in the opposite side of the mound as well.

  “You don’t ask for much,” Philip huffed.

  She was already wrapping a handkerchief round her last arrow. “You must trust me.”

  “I do trust you—even though at this point, I’ve got a bloody long list of reasons not to.” He smirked, his sword still upraised.

  She tilted her head in almost-mock frustration. “You’re starting to talk like me again. But here is my reason: I need another fiery arrow, and to make one of those, you rather need some fire. The only fire in this fortress is in those torches, and it’s starting to rain.”

  As if to amplify her words, several drops dotted their shoulders.

  “All right. Why, exactly?”

  “We’re going to make the wall explode.”

  He raised his brows, but he knelt and offered his hands.

  She stepped onto them, pressing against the stone mound to keep her balance. “All right, lift.”

  He hoisted her up the wall. As he did, the falling rain thickened, dousing the already-struggling flame. She covered the wrapped arrowhead to make sure it stayed dry before she leapt back to the ground.

  Rain wasn’t going to make this battle any easier. And it certainly wasn’t going to help them blow up the wall.

  Philip rubbed his sore palms together. “What now?”

  Arliss returned the way she had come, pleading that God would relent with the rain shower. She leapt back across the river, and Philip surged after her. They found Adam struggling to drag Kenton’s body farther from the fighting.

  “Any grand ideas now, princess?” Adam gritted his teeth.

  “I’m working on it.” She planted a foot on the bottom step of the left stairwell and turned to Philip. “Cover for me. I’m going to climb halfway up and see if I can reach the torch from there. The length of my arm plus the length of the arrow ought to be enough.”

  “Go.” Philip tilted his sword back and forth in a standard guard position.

  She had almost reached the middle of the stone stairs when the grunts and shouts at the top of the mound became too loud and erratic for her to ignore. Looking up, she saw Thane mercilessly beating down on Nathanael as their fight raged on. Nathanael was faltering. Even she could notice flaws in his form.

  She felt for that last arrow to place on the bow. Perhaps, if she aimed just perfectly, she could injure Thane without killing him—and without piercing Nathanael on the way to him. She drew back the arrow and searched for the most propitious target.

  She had no time to find a mark. Even if she had, her arrow could not have reached in time. Every moment seemed as a thousand. She helplessly watched Thane’s cruel smile as he penetrated Nathanael’s defenses. His sword pierced the center of her uncle’s torso.

  Nathanael staggered back towards the staircase. He tripped and tumbled down towards her. Bracing herself against the stone, she brought his fall to a halt. Her eyes had already flooded when she looked into his—eyes which held the strong resolve of a dying man.

  “No.” She gripped his hand. “I have done this to you. I have done all of this.”

  He clamped down on her hand with surprising strength. “Arliss, none of this is your fault. Thane would have attacked us no matter what you had done. If not for you, we could all be dead.”

  Grunting down the pain, he leaned up and kissed her forehead gently, even as she had kissed his at that knighting just one week earlier. She felt like that had been someone else, another person’s body she had inhabited. It all seemed so distant now.

  Nathanael still held on, both to life and to her hand. “Never stop fighting. Thane will not stop until he sees Reinhold destroyed, or until he himself is destroyed. Promise me, Arliss, that you will not let him prevail! He comes from a more ancient evil than you know.”

  “I promise. I promise.” She trembled.

  He laid his head back, his eyes almost closed. “Tell your mother I love her.” A quiet breath escaped his lungs, and his hand lost its grip on hers.

  She bent over him, kissing his sweaty forehead as he had kissed hers. Then, she glanced up towards Thane as she slowly pushed herself to her feet. There was a reason Thane had not disturbed Nathanael’s last words.

  Philip’s and Thane’s swords collided in a flash of shimmering metal.

  CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE: ONE FINAL ARROW

  As she hurried to and from the wall with armfuls of Lasairbláth, Ilayda had seen most everything that had happened. Now, dropping the last of the snowy petals against the wall, she stood on her toes in order to see through the throng of soldiers and swords.

  Arliss stood halfway up the left staircase, just above Lord Nathanael’s body, and she seemed to be motioning for Ilayda. Ilayda gestured to herself. Arliss nodded, but also pointed behind Ilayda to Erik and Brallaghan.

  Ilayda understood. “Arliss needs us. Hurry!” She dashed toward the far left, forcing her way to the stone mound.

  Brallaghan dragged behind. “But the wall—”

  “Oh, come on.” Erik took the lead as they reached the base of the stone staircase.

  Rain pattered on Ilayda’s face as she shouted up to Arliss. “What now?”

  Arliss's voice seemed deeper, darker—hoarse and dry, Ilayda thought. “Erik, Brallaghan—get my father out of here. He is wounded and cannot walk. You must also get my uncle’s body out. Lord Adam will help you. Do it quickly, and get everyone away from the wall as soon as you can!”

  “But what about the dam?” Brallaghan was incredulous.

  “You handled the flowers, didn’t you? Let me handle the rest. Now go!”

  Ilayda held Arliss’s gaze for a moment. She didn’t want to leave her friend to her death. But Arliss knew what she was doing.

  She turned to leave.

  Reaching as far out from the stairs as she could, Arliss held the bound tip of her last arrow in the flame. It caught easily enough.
How easily would it be extinguished?

  Atop the platform, Thane and Philip parried back and forth, their swords flying like a hurricane. Careful not to blow out the flame with her movements, Arliss tested every step up the mound. The higher she got, the more she could feel and smell the chilly mountain air. Up above, the clouds had all but blotted out the sinking sun.

  As she reached the top, the duel swung in Thane’s favor. Philip cut down from his shoulder at Thane, who sidestepped the cut and brought his curved blade down sharply on Philip’s. Philip tried to spin his way out of the deadlock, but Thane thrust his sword over and around Philip’s neck halfway through the spin. Both blades pressed against Philip’s neck.

  Arliss found the flat stone at the pinnacle of the platform and readied her arrow. She glared at Thane. “Release him, or I destroy this fortress.”

  Thane laughed. “You cannot destroy this fortress, Arliss. It is impregnable, and you know it.”

  “No human fortress is impregnable. All strongholds can be demolished.”

  Below them, Erik and Brallaghan bore away Kenton’s wounded form, and Lord Adam carefully hoisted away Nathanael’s slender body. Reinholdian guards cleared a path for them even as Erik called for the retreat.

  Tilting his head towards the scene beneath them, Thane scoffed at Arliss. “Your forces are retreating. Your uncle is dead. Your father is wounded. And here, I hold the life of your friend in my very hands.”

  She lifted her drawn bow. “And I hold your life—the life of your fortress—in mine.” Rain began to fall lightly again. “Please, Thane. Neither of us have to do this. You don’t have to keep killing and destroying. You are one of us—a man of Reinhold, my cousin. You said so yourself!”

  “I was never a man of Reinhold. I could never be such. No matter what, you would all drive me away as you did twelve years ago.”

  “You drove yourself away with your greed and pride.”